The Beautiful Agony of the Subjective

“Objective art is meditative art, subjective art is mind art.”

 

According to Osho, the Indian guru, most art is subjective. That is, it is the active “psychic vomiting” by the creator of dreams, hopes, nightmares, visions, and anything else buried in the mind that is then imposed on the viewer, causing them, in turn, some sort of distress. A bad thing, Osho says.

 

Oh, if my art can cause distress, I am a happy man! Because generated emotion, as I see it, is the pinnacle of art. Forcing someone to laugh, or cry, or get anxious with what is ostensibly a passive medium (it doesn’t reach out and smack you with a brick, after all), is, to my way of thinking, a sort of miracle to be celebrated. So as a filmmaker, I seek it with every word I write, and every shot I block, and every tune I choose.

 

Conversely, objective art, says the guru formerly known as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, comes from emptiness, silence, from meditation. It is only from this place then that art can be created that is universal and timeless. He quotes a Basho haiku about a frog jumping into an ancient pond. He does not reference Citizen Kane.

 

I suppose the reason that a great film can never be truly enlightened and “objective” in Osho’s vernacular is because agents are involved. Just kidding. It’s because movies NEED a point of view, whatever it may be. The stronger the better. Otherwise it just lies there. Like an ancient pond, I guess. And maybe that’s the point.

 

Then again, Osho’s followers were convicted of putting salmonella in an Oregon salad bar to sway an election issue in the 80’s.

 

Clearly, psychic vomiting wasn’t their only interest.